Saturday, May 16, 2009

No, I did not invent the title above. I stole it from Mad magazine. Maybe some of you have never read this magazine before. Well, if you have not, then I suggest you don’t. If not you might turn out like me. And we don’t want that do we? Anyway, for your weekend reading, I shall walk you through a host of issues in response to what currently ails this country.NO HOLDS BARRED

Raja Petra Kamarudin

PPP set to oust Murugiah today

The PPP is expected to expel supreme council member Datuk T. Murugiah from the party today. The supreme council is meeting to follow up on its near-unanimous decision last week for Murugiah to be removed.

Party president Datuk M. Kayveas confirmed that action would be taken against the Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department. “Under the party constitution, we can institute action against him which includes suspension or expulsion. He has acted in serious breach of party rules and I will not defend him this time,” he said in an interview.

Kayveas said the next course of action would be for the party to seek Murugiah’s removal as Deputy Minister. “I will submit the name of his replacement to Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak,” he added.

Kayveas said Murugiah was welcome to attend the meeting and “present his case”, adding that the supreme council would sit as the disciplinary board today.

Kayveas had said last week that Murugiah was involved in money politics and had offered contracts to party members to strengthen himself in his bid to contest a post in the coming party elections. – The Star

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Did Murugiah really do that -- play money politics? I don’t know -- but if he did what is wrong with that? I mean, isn’t that the SOP for Barisan Nasional? (For the uninitiated, SOP means Standard Operating Procedure and not Son Of Prostitute, although when it comes to Barisan Nasional you sometimes really can’t tell the difference).

What is Murugiah’s real ‘crime’? Word has it Barisan Nasional is upset because he was involved in the group that ‘invaded’ the mortuary to photograph Kugan’s badly mutilated body.

The government says Kugan’s family and supporters locked themselves in the mortuary after illegally forcing their way in and mutilated Kugan’s family for the benefit of the photo shoot. As my late mother used to say: pull my other leg, it’s got bells on it. No, I am not going to explain what that means for the benefit of those who learned English in Bahasa Malaysia. If you don’t know what that means then blame the Malaysian education system.

Make no bones about it. Murugiah’s only ‘crime’ is to contradict the government. And this is most embarrassing to the government because they can’t any longer sweep the Kugan issue under the carpet and accuse the family of faking the injuries.

Actually, this is not the first time Murugiah has crossed swords with the government. Murugiah should do what Zaid Ibrahim did. He should resign as a Minister and join the ranks of the ‘independent politicians’ to fight for truth and justice outside the established political party platform.

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Stop troubling the people, Khairy tells Opposition

Umno Youth chief Khairy Jamaluddin has told the opposition to stop troubling the people with unnecessary by-elections.

“During the economic slowdown, all efforts should be focused on generating development and the economy for the people’s benefit instead of busy calling for by-elections,” he said after a function at the Guar Perahu community hall here. — Bernama

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In spite of Khairy’s most impressive educational background, he still does not appear to get it. Elections are good for the people. Let me repeat that: elections are good for the people. This is the time when Barisan Nasional returns to the people the billions it has stolen.

Do you know that when Umno announced they might be boycotting the Penanti by-election many Umno people were very disappointed? They were hoping to see at least one by-election every month. This is when money would flow like there is no tomorrow.

Hundreds of million are spent on by-elections. Even small dirt tracks that have never seen tarred roads in 52 years since Merdeka are surfaced overnight. Dinners are held every night and ang pows are handed out to each and every voter, even to members of the media.

Read what Din wrote in his Blog below.

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Let me open another open secret.

UMNO survives out of mostly the volunteers, sympathisers, and machinery outside the UMNO organisational structure. In other words, outside Gurkhas.

Unlike the opposition, UMNO members are not generally true members and real activists. UMNO is dependent on outsiders rather than within themselves. A simple thing like putting up posters is done by paid contractors; who could be opposition sympathisers; and not they themselves doing it!

Yes, that’s right. Umno practices outsourcing. People are paid to string up posters and banners. Everything is money, money, and even more money. The opposition supporters walk over to the Umno operation centre to receive money. But they will vote for the opposition.

It is quiet hilarious, really. You see these opposition supporters climbing trees and lampposts to put up Barisan Nasional flags and posters. And they are paid good money to do that. And then they walk over to the opposition operation centre to collect the opposition posters and banners and put them up free of charge.

Voters are paid money to attend free dinners and ceramah organised by Barisan Nasional. After that, they pay to attend the opposition dinners -- even if there is no longer any food to eat because of the overwhelming response. And then, when the donation box if passed around, they take out the money from the ang pows they received from Barisan Nasional and put the money into the opposition donation box.

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Off late, particularly after the General Election, there has been much attention given to Bloggers to seek their assistance to disseminate information.

On the event day of BUM 2009, I say that that is what Bloggers should not be doing. Bloggers are independent individuals who should freely Blog to express and share their thoughts and viewpoint with honesty and clarity.

They are supposed to be independent, critical thinking and fair-minded. They are not supposed to be told what to pursue and not pursue. They are not somebody else's mouthpiece and to pursue subject of their own interest. We are not supposed to waste our space, bloody airtime, and traffic of readers to be only doing the bidding for UMNO or PKR or PAS or BN or DAP.http://anotherbrickinwall.blogspot.com/2009/05/of-ahmad-maslan-bloggers-seeked-and.html

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Exactly! I agree with what Din said. Once upon a time I used to run the Free Anwar Campaign website. As the name suggests, that website was meant to campaign for Anwar Ibrahim’s release from prison. Simultaneously, I was involved with Berita Keadilan, and then Seruan Keadilan, the PKR party newspaper -- now called Suara Keadilan.

The problem, though, was that I was not allowed to be independent. The website carried Anwar’s name and the newspaper the party’s name. So I was forced to observe certain rules and regulations.

My commentaries, which were critical of the opposition, were not well received by the party leadership. I even received memos from Anwar with the Sungai Buloh Prison logo on them chastising me for being too independent.

I have no problems with that. When you work for an organisation then you have to observe the rules and regulations of that organisation. And if you don’t like it then leave.

And that is what I did. I left and started my own website, Malaysia Today, which allows me to maintain my independence. Of course, there are those who interpreted this as me going into crisis with Anwar Ibrahim. And when I joined forces with Tun Dr Mahathir in 2006, they took that as proof that I had fallen out with Anwar and had ‘crossed over to the other side’.

How narrow-minded these people are. They scream about independence. Yet they can’t understand the meaning of the word. In the early stages of the Bloggers Union, I told both my Umno friends as well as those from the opposition that I would like to see the day when we can all sit at the same table and buy each other a drink although we may subscribe to different political ideologies.

This almost happened -- although we were merely united by our opposition to Abdullah Ahmad Badawi rather than for any other reason. But never mind, I thought. The reason may be less than noble. But if that can be the start of a union of Bloggers that cuts across all political divides then why not?

But the union was short-lived -- mainly because of the Malaysian mindset. Malaysians can’t see the wood for the trees. And this is not just the Umno chaps but also the opposition supporters as well who are guilty of this.

Take the case of the Perak Sultan as an example. I oppose the MANNER in which the Sultan resolved the crisis but I understand the REASON. Now, what is the difference between the two?

The pro-opposition supporters would close their minds to the reason and just focus on the manner. And if we say we agree with the reason they take it that we also agree with the manner or are pro-Monarchy or whatever.

That is stupid -- so, so stupid. And if there’s one thing that irritates me like hell and puts me off sex for a whole hour it is stupidity. I detest stupidity. I have a very low tolerance for stupidity. Call me arrogant if you wish. Accuse me of thinking that I am too smart, smarter than everyone else, if that makes you happy. But stupidity just turns my stomach.

Soon after the 8 March 2008 general election, the Sultan summoned all the Pakatan Rakyat State Assemblypersons to the palace to get their individual and personal assurances that they agree to form a unity government in Perak. And they all said yes, yes, yes.

That’s right, the Pakatan Rakyat Perak government was a unity government. Barisan Nasional is a party of 14 component members. Pakatan Rakyat is not a party of three component members. It is a unity government of three parties. So the Sultan had to tread very carefully here. Individually, Barisan Nasional has more seats than DAP, PKR and PAS -- although, collectively, it may appear like Pakatan Rakyat has more seats.

Yes, collectively, is the key word here.

So we need to collect all the seats of the three non-Barisan Nasional parties and merge them into a unity government. Only then would they out-gun Barisan Nasional. And this was what was done.

But when the unity government broke apart and they lost their majority, then the agreement originally entered into no longer exists. Yes, it was an agreement. And the agreement was that the DAP, PKR and PAS State Assemblypersons all agree to combine or merge their seats under a unity government.

But what the Sultan should not have done is to sack the Pakatan Rakyat Menteri Besar. He should have allowed the Perak State Assembly to pass a vote of no confidence against the Menteri Besar. And if the vote of no confidence is passed with a majority vote then the Pakatan Rakyat government falls.

So, people, oppose the Sultan for the manner the government was changed. But question Pakatan Rakyat, not the Sultan, on the reason. It is not the Sultan’s fault that three State Assemblypersons crossed over. But it is the Sultan’s fault that a deadlock exists in Perak today.

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The truth is that, it was e mailed to me by someone whom Raja Petra trusted and personally gave him a copy of the document. That is something I can prove.

When the SD was published in the blogs, which caught him really by surprise. He intended to use the SD for something ‘big and planned’. When it was produced in public domain earlier than his plan, it somewhat disrupted his plan.

Yes, that is what Zakir revealed in his Blog. He thought he managed to put a spanner in the works by pre-empting my move. Actually that is not the reason at all. And I am not sure whether he knows this so I will give him the benefit of the doubt in the spirit of friendship.

You see, I was hauled up by the police and eventually charged not because I had signed that Statutory Declaration. Even if they had wanted to charge me, at the most it would have been for a charge of signing a false declaration.

And this would mean they would have to prove I had signed a false declaration. I need not do anything. I just sit back and wait for them to prove it. The onus is on them to prove my guilt. And, better still: if I can instead prove I did not sign a false declaration but, in fact, what I signed was true, then they would be sunk.

But they moved the goalposts. What they did instead was, they hauled me up because my Statutory Declaration had gone public and was published on Zakir’s website. It is not the signing of the Statutory Declaration that was the issue. It was the publicising of it. And that fact has now been admitted by Zakir himself.

The issue the police focused on is whether I was the one who gave Zakir a copy of the Statutory Declaration with instructions to publish it on his Blog. It was not the signing of it that troubled them. It was the publishing of it. And was the publishing of it my idea?

So it was Zakir, a fellow Blogger, who helped the police nail me. By publishing it in his Blog he helped the police build their case against me. I am now facing criminal defamation charges because my Statutory Declaration appeared on Zakir’s Blog.

So now they need no longer talk about whether what I signed is true or false. They only need to prove that I signed, which they can do easily enough since I never denied it, and then send me to jail for three years plus for whatever additional years in the event I fail to pay the fine imposed.

I don’t know whether Zakir knows it is because of him I am now inevitably facing a jail sentence. Or was this intended all along?

Hmm, serves me right for trusting an Umno Blogger and thinking that he is one of the rare types who is matured enough to agree to disagree. I suppose Umno will always be Umno, never mind how highly educated they may be or where they went to school. Maybe it is in the Malay gene. Sad, very sad. There goes the Malayu Baru that I thought the Internet had helped develop.